This brief by Wanda Nowicka presents her experience and observations, as an advocate for women’s rights, of the last 20 years of struggles for sexual and reproductive health and rights.
She provides examples of how human rights related to sexual and reproductive health have been addressed in UN policy-setting bodies, such as the Commission on the Status of Women and Commission on Population and Development, as well as in the UN human rights system such as Treaty Monitoring Bodies and Human Rights Council. Given her work with European institutions, she provides examples of important decisions by the Council of Europe and the European Court of Human Rights. Lastly, she discusses growing opposition to a progressive human rights agenda and the universality of human rights.
A discussion note of the United Nations Special Rapporteur on the right of everyone to the highest attainable standard of physical and mental health, Anand Grover.
This discussion note discusses how anchoring developmental priorities in human rights can go a long way in addressing the lapses of the previous framework of the Millenium Development Goals (MDGs), particularly in identifying progress indicators, whatever the framework to be adopted.
It outlines three priority areas, as identified by 17 UN Special Rapporteurs, predicated on a human rights approach to development to inform the agenda, each of which is particularly relevant for the fulfillment of the right to health. These are:
- reducing inequalities
- national social protection floors
- double accountability
This paper publisehed in Reproductive Health Matters presents a review of the meta-narrative guiding the Holy See’s positions, discourses and tensions with regards to sexual and reproductive health rights.
The Holy See represents a fundamentally conservative and stable position on a range of sexual and reproductive health rights concerns. However, the mission has been dynamic in the ways in which it has forwarded its arguments, increasingly relying upon secularised technical claims and empirical evidence; strategically interpreting human rights norms in ways consistent with its own position; and framing sexuality and reproduction in the context of “the family”.
Seen in the broader context of a “religious resurgence” in international relations, and in light of the fact that the Holy See has frequently sought to form alliances with conservative State and non-State actors, these findings make an important contribution to understanding the slow progress as well as the potential obstacles that lie ahead in the battle to realise sexual and reproductive health rights in a changing global political environment.
Alice M Miller and Mindy J Roseman, Reproductive Health Matters
Abstract: Over the past 20 years, advocates have gained formal recognition for some rights in sexuality and reproduction and established the application of human rights standards to sexual and reproductive health issues more generally. However, careful reflection on the state of norm development across sexuality and reproduction as a field reveals fractures and stagnation in the development of standards, and a lack of synergy among advocates and between frameworks for similar rights. This paper seeks to stimulate a more careful accounting for these realities. It examines the formal processes and rules guiding standard-setting, in light of the different intellectual and ideological genealogies of sexual and reproductive rights. We use (homo)sexual orientation and abortion as case studies of current high-profile human rights standard-setting, with specific attention to the contemporary state of human rights law-making in the United Nations today. By placing these two issues in conjunction, we seek to make visible relationships between the vicious political debates in the UN on abortion and sexual orientation, and the multiple and sometimes divergent statements of independent experts and expert bodies in the UN human rights system on these and other sexual and reproductive rights issues. We offer no answers but seek to highlight the need for more investigation and self-reflection by advocates and scholars on how these forces operate and how to work with them.
This Guide published by Reproductive Health Matters seeks to provide insight and resources to actors interested in the development of rights claims around sexuality and sexual health.
After engaging with the vexed question of the scope of sexual rights, it explores the rules and principles governing the way in which human rights claims are developed and applied to sexuality and sexual health, and how that development is linked to law and made a matter of state obligation.
This statement was delivered by Action Canada for Population and Development on behalf of the Sexual Rights Initiative. It was made during the Panel Discussion on Preventable Maternal Mortality and Morbidity & Human Rights on March 9, 2017 within the framework of the 34th session of the Human Rights Council.
The statement points out that “violations of women and girls’ sexual and reproductive rights that lead to these sobering statistics remain largely unaddressed by States in this foremost body on human rights”. It goes on to say that: “A human rights based approach to eliminating preventable maternal mortality and morbidity is built upon the basic understanding that women and girls have the right to have control over all aspects of their sexuality and their body.”
Addressing the impact of culture, religion or national exceptionalism, the statement clearly rejects their attempts to “undermine our sexual and reproductive rights”.
Conclusively, the statement “call[s] on all States to respond to the crisis of maternal mortality and morbidity with the urgency it so deserves by challenging the deeply rooted forces of gender inequality which violate the rights of women and girls around the world”.
Following the adoption of a resolution on the protection of the rights of the child at the 34th session of the Human Rights Council, the Center for Reproductive Rights, the Sexual Rights Initiative, and Child Rights Connect have released a joint statement.
Today, March 24th, the Human Rights Council adopted a resolution on the protection of the rights of the child in the implementation of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.
The resolution, led by the EU and GRULAC, aimed to provide a child’s rights lens to the achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). However, the adopted text does not represent the most advanced human rights standards pertaining to the protection of the rights of the child and falls below the agreement reached in the 2030 Agenda.
In particular, the resolution fails to incorporate the right to be heard, the right to participate, adolescents’ rights to sexual and reproductive health, and the principle of evolving capacities. Moreover, the resolution neglects the particular needs of children with disabilities and LGBTI children and does not recognize that family environments are often sites of violence, especially for girls.
As the highest political body dedicated to the promotion of human rights, the Council has a duty to move beyond the status quo, to champion the core principle of universality of human rights for all and to move forward in the development of norms and standards. The Council must demonstrate the political will and leadership necessary to address the protection of the rights of all children everywhere, bearing in mind that they are active agents in their own lives and rights holders under international human rights law.
This statement made at the 34th Human Rights Council session puts forward two criticisms of the report of the Special Rapporteur on the rights of persons with disabilities.
It was delivered by Action Canada for Population and Development on behalf of the Sexual Rights Initiative.
Firstly, the statement condems the report’s negligence to acknowledge “the family as primary perpetrators of sexual violence”. Secondly, it criticises the assumed lack of legal capacity of women and girls with disabilities.
Finally, the statement calls upon “the Human Rights Council, United Nations and member states to shift focus to the empowerment, sexual well-being, freedom to express desires and self determination of women and girls with disability, and away from protective measures.”
AWID made a statement at the 34th HRC session to highlight the importance of protecting cultural rights in times of increasing religious and right-wing fundamentalisms.
At the 34th session of the Human Rights Council the Association for Women’s Rights in Development (AWID) gave a statement in support of the Special Rapporteur in the field of cultural rights. Her report highlighted the threatening emergence of religious and right-wing fundamentalisms that try to undermine the universality of cultural rights as well as human rights.
AWID “note[s] with concern the rising trend of states and non-state actors who use arguments based on anti-rights interpretations of religion, culture and tradition to roll back fundamental rights – particularly women’s rights and gender justice – and justify state impunity” and agrees that everyone has the right to take part in cultural life.
The final recommendation for states is to “safeguard and protect cultural rights on a basis of equality”, and for United Nations bodies “to support efforts to oppose rising fundamentalisms and extremism”.
A coalition of women human rights defenders draw the attention of the Human Rights Council to the ‘wake-up call of our times’, and reject the normalisation of fundamentalist and extremist rhetoric.
Governments relying on the manipulation of ideas about culture to attack human rights defenders were put on the spotlight yesterday at the Human Rights Council. A coalition of organisations supporting women human rights defenders urged States from all regions to ‘wake up’ and be genuine in their fight against extremist and fundamentalist ideologies.
On behalf of the Women Human Rights Defenders International Coalition, ISHR highlighted the importance of ensuring the genuine and safe participation of women human rights defenders in policies and programmes to combat fundamentalist ideologies and rhetoric. ‘In too many instances, civil society groups that oppose fundamentalist and extremist ideologies are themselves branded as threats to State security’ said Ms Pooja Patel, Programme Manager at ISHR. She called on States to remove barriers and obstacles for independent civil society members who promote rights in accordance with international standards.
The Human Rights Council engaged in dialogue with the UN expert on Cultural Rights Karima Bennoune on Friday and Monday. In her report, Ms Bennoune outlined that those defending the rights of women to take part in cultural life are de facto cultural rights defenders. As cultural rights defenders, they are the very antidote to fundamentalist and extremist agendas.
In a joint statement on International Women Human Rights Defenders Day last November, a number of other UN experts had also raised concern over the wave of populism and fundamentalism taking place in the world, and highlighted that ‘women human rights defenders represent an essential counter-power and a colossal force of action’.
